On the night of Monday, February 17, Russia and Ukraine exchanged massive strikes using drones. There are casualties on both sides. As a result of one of the attacks, a fire broke out “not far from the oil refinery” in the village of Ilsky in the Krasnodar Territory, Shot writes. Residents of the village of Severskaya in the Ilsky district of Kuban reported a series of explosions in the sky at about 1 a.m. “The wreckage of one of the UAVs crashed not far from the local oil refinery,” Shot reported. Judging by the published footage, the drone caused a massive fire. Astra also writes, citing local residents, that drones attacked the oil refinery. The VChK-OGPU and Mash, citing eyewitnesses, reported the fire at the plant. The Ilsky Oil Refinery belongs to the Kuban Oil and Gas Company. The Armed Forces of Ukraine have attacked the facility twice in the past year: on June 21 and February 9. As a result of the latest strike, the largest primary oil refining unit in terms of productivity, AVT-6, with a capacity of 3.6 million tons per year, was damaged. In December, more than 70 billion rubles were invested in the modernization of the plant in order to launch the production of commercial gasoline there by the end of 2025, The Moscow Times reports.
Later, Krasnodar Governor Veniamin Kondratyev confirmed a “massive UAV attack” on the territory of the region. According to him, 12 houses were damaged due to the fall of the drone debris in the village of Ilsky. One woman required medical assistance. Emergency services were working at the scene. Earlier, Kondratyev reported the destruction of drones in Slavyansk-on-Kuban. After the debris fell on private houses, a four-year-old girl was injured and taken to the hospital.
The Russian Defense Ministry reported the interception of 90 drones. 38 drones were shot down over the Azov Sea, 24 over the Krasnodar Territory, 15 over occupied Crimea, 7 over the Black Sea, two in the Kursk and Rostov Regions, and one in the Bryansk and Belgorod Regions. “A Neptune-MD guided missile was also destroyed over the Azov Sea,” the department reported.
On Monday afternoon, it became known that a Ukrainian drone had attacked the Kropotkinskaya intermediate oil pumping station of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) in Kuban. “Oil is being pumped through the CPC system at reduced speeds, bypassing the damaged station,” the company told RBC.
In turn, Russian troops attacked Ukraine overnight with 147 Shaheds and drone imitators, the country’s Air Force reported. “As of 09:00, 83 Shahed-type attack UAVs and other types of drones have been confirmed shot down in the Kharkiv, Poltava, Sumy, Chernihiv, Cherkasy, Kyiv, Kirovohrad, Zaporizhia, Dnipropetrovsk and Odessa regions. 59 enemy simulators have been lost (without negative consequences). As a result of the enemy attack, Kharkiv, Kyiv, Poltava and Zaporizhia regions suffered,” the Armed Forces of Ukraine specified. Ukrenergo reported emergency power outages due to Russian attacks on the country’s energy facilities. According to the State Emergency Service, Russian drone strikes also hit four districts of the Kyiv region. Two warehouses, four private houses and two cars were damaged. A local resident born in 2003 was injured.